Articles in the archive contain broken links because
outdated files are removed.

January
24, 1997

WhaleBoyHuge congratulations to WhaleBoy
on becoming the newest member of the Ion Storm team (he will start work as an artist there
almost immediately). That's right, the boy is talented enough to hang with the Romero and
his crew. Well done.

AirFistLots of people have complained about not being able to download Christopher Bolin's new mod AirFist from the AirFist Page, so here's a local link. I urge you to check this out... it's pretty
wild. Airfist is an air gun that you can use as a weapon, to rocket jump, to deflect
oncoming rockets (no kidding), and even move objects around (change the balance of a
deathmatch by blowing some armor in the lava perhaps...). Awesome stuff.

QuakeCast Wrap-UpHad a ball on QuakeCast
last night, thanks to all our terrific guests, Sascha Dikiciyan of Cyber Age Studios, Redwood, Bastard from PlanetQuake, She_Liveth,
and Fargo. Fargo and I played around on the T1 afterwards, and I see today that he wrote
the whole thing (and I mean the whole thing) up on Fargo's Frontpage, where he reveals what a
sadistic maniac I become when I get my shot at being an LPB in a very funny, very lengthy
article.

Just For Fun
Thanks to Freaek for pointing out the homepage
of a band called Blue. And heaven help us
all, a humor site devoted to Pork Riblets.

Paradox InterviewThere is an interview with Hipnotic's Tom Mustaine up on The Worldcraft Editing Site. Words of
editing wisdom from the level pimp himself.

QuakeScape?One of the coolest little doodads to come across my desk in a while just
showed up. Check out the Quake Throbber by Paul Steffens, which consists of a pair of
bitmaps you place in your Netscape program directory, and suddenly the little Netscape
meteor shower (called the Throbber, according to Paul) is replaced by a spinning Quad
Damage for the ultimate Quake browser! (This only works with Netscape 3, and
Communicator).

Port NewsThere's a big update on ThreeWave about the
state of all the ports Zoid's working on, including his priorities (thanks BigNachos).

Return of the ClanwarsThe Clanwars page is back in
operation (except for the message board for the moment).

MinLightEditor types may want to check out MinLight, available at Munyul's homepage. This small utility allows
you to set the minimum light level for your map. It's like setting an ambient light level.

Plans!DaKoTa, the man of
.plan, discovered three new plan updates, Jim Dosé, Levelord, and Michael Hadwin
(Hipnotic's bubbling). Here are excerpts from each:

Levelord:

It's the last night before beta testing and guess whose got
the two levels holding up the entire process? ...yes, the Levelord's. Two sticky maps and
two that take half-a-day to VIS. It's always at the end of a project that the real
gremlins come out to play.

Jim and Mark are showing Tom some of the cool tricks and
secrets of Rise of the Triad. I'm still convinced that it is the best deathmatch game of
it's time because of the weapons and all the different ways of attacking and defending.
Just wait till these brains are unleashed on Quake ;)

ROTT hmmm? No comment. This from Hadwin:

23Jan97
Finishing the last touches of the pack today. The Beta is done! It's amazing that I still
get an adrenaline rush everytime I play it. (Lord knows, I've played it 50 zillion times)
I hope all of you enjoy Armagon He's one bad mofo (It's the one that says BadMotherF*cker
on it! - Jules)

What's next on Hipnotic's agenda? Well, first we're wrapping
up the publishing deal for our next project. We'll be making announcements about this in
the coming weeks. Then we'll be signing the lease on our new offices (YEEEHAAAAA!) and
getting them redecorated. We are going to have one cool-ass new pad! During this time we
will also be aggressively searching for new employees (nope, no one's leaving, we're
expanding!) You'll also be seeing our totally new and revised web page (finally!). Of
course, throughout all this, we'll be designing the first full original game from
Hipnotic, which will be out sometime next year. This is going to be a busy/exciting year
for Hipnotic!

BTW, this goes to Ron Jamero: If you ever need any help with
tough words like "leet" and possibly "w00d", just ask me. I think I
remember your AOL address. ;)

Ron Jamero RepliesRon Jamero also updated his .plan today:

This is for Nacirema and Dim Jose:

Remember when you left high school and all those crazy little
baby words behind when you ventured into the big, sCary man-world out there? Well, that's
why i'm having some trouble drinking-down these alphanumeric pseudo-words, because i AM in
a man's world and i DON'T remember that 1337 slang!

Like Kevin Cloud said, i ain't down with llambonics. Bleat.

May i refer you to the Webster's Third Unabridged Dictionary
for the language that we all use -- English. Don't be afraid. Come into the light.

AirFistCheck out AirFist,
a new weapon mod from Christopher Bolin and The Evolve development team:

The Evolve development team is proud to release the AirFist
1.0.

The AirFist is a completely unique weapon that keeps up with
the frantic, "twitch-reaction" Quake gameplay. After days of brainstorming, our
goal to be the best independent mod since the grappling hook was conceived.

It was an attempt to build a completely new kind of weapon
and not a deriviative of the already very potent id collection. The weapon had to be
"balanced", well tested, radically change gameplay, and ROCK! 3 weeks for the
whole team was spent developing, testing and tuning. This is no weekend mod knockoff. We
wanted the weapon to feel and play so well that playing without it feels awkward.

Here is a quick list of features:

A defensive weapon that keeps up with the frantic
"twitch-reaction" Quake gameplay

Totally unique concept and play!

Realistic physics modeling

New model, artwork and sounds.

Rocking deathmatch support.

An effective defense against rockets and nails. (A barrage of
rockets no longer means certain death.)

Use it to blast up and over lava pits, or up to ledges, or out
of hotspots.

QCamHere is an updated QuakeCam, now version
1.1, which fixes a few bugs and adds some cameras.

Clanbase
The Clanbase wants to create a database
of clan information to help ease the difficulty in setting up matches.

January
23, 1997

QuakeCastAnother Thursday night with no updates... I'm off to do the QuakeCast (90 minutes, live at 8:30 PM
EST, and subsequently in the archives).
Tonight's guests include Sascha Dikiciyan of Cyber Age
Studios (who we had to cut off last week), and a couple of prominent webmasters, Redwood, and Bastard from PlanetQuake. Girlbomb is going to talk with
She_Liveth of the Immortal Ones about Quake from the female perspective. We're also
expecting visits from Fargo of Fargo's
Frontpage and Toe, organizer of the Bloodpool Tournament (BTW, check out the Bloodpool Pictures, an homage to deathmatch and
poor photography).

sCary LivesThe Quakeholio's not dead, it just has a little DNS problem... it should
clear up for most pretty quickly, but in the meantime, use this link (with the IP address).

Also, DaKoTa points out that Mark
Dochtermann, Levelord, and Paradox all updated their .plans. Here's an excerpt from each
(obviously their add-on is coming soon).

Excerpt from Mark Dochtermann:

There is a fascinating phenomenon that occurs shortly befor
the release of a project. Everything breaks itself, all is chaos. Miraculously after
pulling your hair out and the realization that all is lost, the project rises like a
phoenix from its chaotic state and all is well. For once I wish a project would ship
without doing this. This would be product number 3 for me, and I am batting 1000

We're, hopefully, going to be passing the pack to our beta
testers tomorrow, ...yippie kaiya, fother mucker! When it hits the streets, I challenge
anyone to find the reference to my three favorite comedians in HIP2M4 - "The
Crypt". Their names are Steve Martin, George Burns, and Shorty Berstein.

Shorty Berstein???

Unaccelerated GL QuakeKevin Martin sends along these
instructions for those who want to experience how pretty GL Quake is (if not how smooth):

FWIW, it _is_ possible to run glquake without an accelerated
3D card, but I _wouldn't_ recommend it to the faint of heart (can you say 2-3
sec/frame?!?). Anyway, here's how:

1. Install glquake.exe in your quake dir.
2. Get Microsoft's OpenGL for Win95.http://www.microsoft.com/kb/softlib/mslfiles/Opengl95.exe
orftp://ftp.microsoft.com/softlib/mslfiles/Opengl95.exe
3. Run Opengl95.exe in a temp dir. This will extract two DLLs (opengl32.dll and glu32.dll)
among other files. You need to use these DLLs instead of the opengl32.dll that comes with
glquake.
4. Copy opengl32.dll and glu32.dll to your quake dir.
5. Make sure you are running in either "High Color" or "True Color"
mode. Do this by changing the "Color pallete" setting in the "Display
Properties" control panel.
6. Now, you can run glquake at blindingly slow rates!

Just to let everyone know, these DLLs only do a _software_
emulation of OpenGL and glquake runs incredibly slow (e.g., on a PPro200, I get one frame
update every 2-15 seconds!!). If you want to run it faster, you need to get a supported 3D
accelerated graphics card. The only ones that are supported right now are the 3dfx based
cards and a few expensive high-end cards.

16 Bit BSP BetaHot on the heels of the 32 bit alpha release, Steve Thoms sends along word of a new 16 bit beta
of BSP, available on his site, The Elite Quake
Editors Corner (now the official BSP download site).

This database contains basic information on each clan,
including names, email, web sites, prefix/suffix, and the BEST part... YOUR CLAN SKIN!
That's right, our database is built to handle your clan skins (as gif files) so that other
clans can search for your name and find your skin!

To make this database a success, we need YOUR help! We are
asking each clan leader to go to http://www.kinglink.com/clanskin/ and fill out an add
form. Once completed, your entry will be added automatically to our database, ready to be
searched by countless clans!

More Log ParsingUffe Friis Lichtenberg sends along word
of his log to HTML converter (available here)
which will allow you to view a game log from a deathmatch in HTML format, generated from
the client's end..

Favorite Editor PollQLEN is having a poll
where you can vote for your favorite editor.

Quake CommandMy buddy Wedge dropped a line to say he's updated the Quake C section of Quake Command. He's just touching base, but he does
mention work he's doing on the RangerCam patch, and reminds everyone that he's not
receiving email at his old nuc.net address. Speaking of which did you see Lag City'sDon't Email Me
Contest? Very funny stuff (not to worry, sCary told me he liked it too)...

Sujoy DemoDon't ask me why I do things like poke around closed Quake sites, but I
found this this demo (1.5 MB) at Sujoy's Quake Pages of Sujoy Roy and his clanmate Nightwing kicking arse and
taking names on a couple of unsuspecting opponents (they really whomp them), but still a
nice opportunity to see Sujoy in action.

Closings
The Quake Associated Poll has called it
quits, citing lack of interest. Thanks Allanon.
I also see Kwiart's is out
of the news biz (the real life thing again), but is considering returning in the future,
perhaps in a new form, and Seismic
Spew is also on hiatus.

CTF Log ParserI got an email from Brad Klassen who, along with some friends has created
a CTF log parser for Windows 95 that takes the qconsole.log created by each ctf game and
breaks down statistics. It provides averages between teams and players. Some of the
options are: Who you killed, who killed you, what you killed with, what you were killed
with, how you died, flag captures, drops, and recoveries. It will also display a bitmap of
the map that was played. It's only at version 0.3 but if you're interested in testing or
providing ideas for add-ons contact elfman@hotmail.com.

MCW & UKSPCModemer's Clan War (MCW) and the UK Single Player Championship (UKSPC) I
mentioned recently have got a website
going.

Quake Widows' Corner
If you've got a Mrs. Blue of your own at home, she might want to check out the Quake Widows' Diary where there's a
message board for her to share her thoughts with others in the same boat.

GL QuakeI was disconnected for a while until sCary rebooted the Internet, so I got
to read on Redwood's page that GLQuake (remember this is an unsupported release) is out,
while he wondered why nobody else was posting it... it was that darned InternetTM. Anyway, here's what John Carmack has to say about all this
in his .plan:

Jan 22

A preliminary release of glquake and the 3dfx driver has been
put on our ftp site in the idstuff/unsup directory.

one hour later...

3dfx gave me a new vxd for glquake that fixes crashing
problems on some pentium pro systems. glquake1.zip now contains the current files.

QuakeWorld RankingsThere has been some fallout since Barf renamed his QuakeWorld Rankings Site the
"official" rankings page. Both OneThumb and Disruptor asked him to stop polling
their servers for user records. Disruptor explains:

"I don't wish to be part of any self-appointed
"official" anything which involves QuakeWorld"

I also got a comment from OneThumb:

"I have 2 beefs with Barf <g>: #1 he's calling
himself official, but he's not sanctioned by id at all. #2 he's polling QWMasters without
their permission, and thus bringing mine down every single night."

I see now that he has relented, and renamed his site the "Definitive" player
listings. Apparently he hasn't contacted Disruptor and OneThumb yet, and it's unclear if
they are going to forgive him and allow him to poll their servers anymore. If this doesn't
work out, take heart, because the work currently being done on the Master Server will soon
allow for easy polling of stats without having to query each user. For the record, not
everyone is upset about this. Here is Bastard's
position, quoted straight from PlanetQuake (PQ
runs a Master, remember):

I've been asked a few times about this so I'll give you our
viewpoint: For the record, we think that there are some great stats pages out there and we
plan to add our effort to the heap. Barf is simply applying marketing hype when he calls
his page "official". Lord knows we don't have enough marketing hype in
cyberspace

Fear the ReaperBeen a while since I could use that headline. The North American War Council is having a
contest where you face off against four Reaper bots.

OoopsAlmost lost a bunch of updates there (computers can be so complex). Thanks
to Kenneth Yu for pointing out the problem so
quickly, and my buddy JUDGECAL from QuakeCast who still had an old version
of the news page in his cache that he mailed me so I could fix it.

Todd's Take
I had an exchange of emails with Todd Hollenshead, CEO of id Software, discussing comments
made in the time since John Romero's departure, including that recent Wired article,
implying that id was becoming technology driven, rather than gameplay oriented:

I find comments about id becoming strictly an "R&D
company" after Romero's departure fairly humorous. We will certainly continue to put
out the best technology, but that doesn't mean that gameplay will take a back seat. We
have launched Quakeworld, and will soon release the Hipnotic and Rogue level packs (btw,
they look *really* good).

Swiss CheeseThat Swiss Quake Contest page is back, having removed all the stolen
graphics, thanks InsomniAX for the word. I've got
to admire their ability to make the best of a bad situation, as I see that they're trying
to make the traffic they received the last time seem like popularity (oops, did I forget
to put in their link?):

We were very surprised after we took a look at our log file.
After 4 days online we had 10189 hits. If you would like to be a sponsor during the Swiss
Quake Contest 1997...

QuakeMap DocumentationQuakeMap author Armin Rigo has released
the first installment of his QuakeMap
documentation in HTML format on Derrick McKay's QuakeMap page. The docs are far from
complete, but so far there are clear explanations of QuakeMap's advanced features, a
couple of sample files, plus a small program to loop sounds to help make "ambient
sounds."

QuakeWorld Rankings UpdateThanks Eucker for the word that The Official QuakeWorld Rankings Site (the
site formerly known as Barf's World) has been updated for all master servers (but Best,
which was down). The site has also had a redesign and looks fantastic.

UKCLClans in the United Kingdom should stop in on the UKCL. The weekday league has been stopped until
further notice, but they're forging ahead with the weekend league, which is being put
together right now.

QuakeWorld UpdateThere is a large update on the RevCo
page that talks about features being worked into the next version of the QuakeWorld
client, including the possibility that you will be able to attach to a server
directy, bypassing the master. Other enhancements mentioned include improved prediction,
and collision detection (no more running through guys!). Exciting stuff, you should check
it out. Thanks to Patrik Ludén. Um, as to the later
update, congrats to Tokay and sCary on their marriage, and condolences on their divorce...
I only hope the kids can cope (thanks to VorpalKreep for
pointing out the deviant update).

TeamFortress MovesThe TeamFortress
page is planning a move to PlanetQuake (thanks Jason Brunette). I also see that the anticipated move
of the QCHQ to PQ has taken place
(interesting, because of the apparent rivalry between the QCHQ and the QCA--which also resides on PlanetQuake).

Time to clarify: I kid PQ about absorbing sites, and I don't think I've done a good
enough job of expressing what an invaluable service to the Quake community that I feel
they're performing. There are many people with wonderful sites and projects out there that
don't have a lot of options as far as webspace, etc., and PlanetQuake is there for them
(for free, no less), and they should be praised for it (I'll make a Borg joke next time).

Rangers--The Lost Episodes, and Other Quake
FictionColdSun, leader of Quake's most
multimedia clan, the Rangers, sends the word
that a Quake fanatic from Hungary learned that ColdSun lost a Rangers Science Fiction
story he had written a while back to a hard disk crash, and was kind to send along a saved
copy. Experts have painstakingly returned the manuscript to its original condition
(electron by electron), and it's been posted on the Rangers'
page (in the comics section).

Another source of Quake Fiction is the Gib
and Nail, bringing you humor from the great white north since 1996. Check under the Quake
Attacks section for an ongoing story written by In Praise of AMMO's Maxim "Bodybag" Savic, which is very well
written. There is also Totally.lag's story Quake-the
Colliding of Dimensions which can be found on the Stories section of the Quake
section of Totally Gaming. And I
guess we can't forget the pioneer in the field, Quake Things, even
though it seems likely never to be updated again.

Site StuffCouple of things... I've gotten a couple of questions about the Total 3D
cards being advertised here... What I know about it is it's a Vérité-based card that
provides a performance boost over its peers by running at a higher clock speed. The card
also includes a 3D sound enhancer and stereo glasses (they don't work with Quake, because
the glasses need to be supported by the game). I haven't checked one out, but I hope to
(one of the things I had to establish when accepting ads for this site was that I would
still comment honestly on advertiser's products; I'd hate to be accused of a conflict of
interest).

Also, I've gotten a couple of emails from readers after stories appeared without
crediting them after they had sent them in. I actually find stuff out myself, or from the
story's subject sometimes, so please nobody take offense if you aren't mentioned. I
promise (as always) to continue to credit the first person to mail me about a story--there
are never any circumstances where I won't.

UK Modemers ClanWar & UK Championship
FA from Frag Kings wrote in to announce two major UK Quake events are shaping up to begin
in two weeks: The Modemers Clan War, and the UK Single Player Championship. FA says both
events will be heavily based on two objectives: fairness and fast results:

The admin team has already been formed with leaders from DC,
members from FK and CP...the final details will be finalised after our meeting and will be
posted on our web site (to be done soon) by next Monday. You can sign up NOW for both
events by emailing eltong@dial.pipex.com: for
the MCW your clan must be able to produce at least 3 modem players for each match (most
likely to be played on Sundays), please state your clan details (URLs, Logo, etc) in your
application email; for the Single Player Championship please state your Quake nick, email
address and type of connection (you will be entered in the appropriate section), and
whether you belong to a clan, as this will give you priorities in entering (clans
contribute more to the Quake social events you see!!). Both QuakeWorld and normal servers
are available for each match, depending on the preference of the players.

QuakeLab MIAFinally an answer to where the QuakeLab went! There is an update that
explains that some sites had his link listed with the IP address (I was one of them--as I
recall Labmaster Steve Fukuda was having DNS
problems with the site at the outset), so when his site changed IP's the link broke. The
proper address for the QuakeLab is http://www.in2nett.com/stevefu/QuakeLab/.
Thanks to Mike Burbidge for answering Steve's
request to pass this news along to me.

Quake64I see on Redwood's that
there's an article on Next Generation that
says Midway will be doing the Quake 64 conversion, based on the impressive results of
their Doom 64 project.

Ruthless Contest|nhuman| of the Ruthless
Bastards is having a Beat the |nhuman| Contest, where you need to finish a level and
beat his time (or, in his words: "Kick some booty ass in hyper speed").

Quake College Players ListCheck out the Quake
College Players List, because, "First came the Universities, Then came Quake,
And finally Quake at the Universities". Deep. Thanks Light.

Get Outta Here!Here's a demo (35 KB) sent along by [DTH]mNk3Y that shows how to exit the final level (Shub
Whatisname's pit), so you can get that deathmatch server moving along again..

January
20, 1997

sCary sCreenshotsThere are more cool screenshots of GL Quake at sCary's that show off the transparent water effect.

CLPThe second roundup of Clan
Leaders Poll results are in. Now I remember who shot my smiley (see next story).

Kee HoleKee Kimbrell does, in fact, work for Ion Storm, and his finger linkshould
work, it's just that they're having trouble with his NT account, hence fingering him
currently brings up a blank screen (which is an improvement--for a while it said "no
such user"). It might not be fixed till next week.

A funny story about Ion Storm's finger links--I got an email from the webmaster over at
IS, who wanted to know if I could tweak my finger script to poll their finger daemon less
often. I had to explain that there was no automated polling of their fingers, and that
this was just the rate at which the maniacal Quake community tended to check these
things...

Snipers UniteHey Lee Harvey, have I got a site for you! Check out Grassy Knoll which is dedicated to
TeamFortress snipers (and we were just speculating on QuakeCast why all these 3D game
companies are near Dallas).

Also, Jeff Hanna is working on an Assassin Quake
Patch, and needs BSP's, so if you're a mad designer who lives to snipe, check out Jeff's page for info, and contact him.

WorldCraft SiteThe web-based WorldCraft FAQ has been updated to become The Official Worldcraft Editing
Site, covering all aspects of editing by combining autolycus' Official Worldcraft FAQ,
and Loki's Worldcraft tutorial and adding a few new sections. They also hope to make a
central point to find user created prefab libraries.

Front EndsA new version of the Quake front-end QFront
2.9 has been released. This fixes a bug with patches that use a pak file other than
pak0.pak (like the CTF Bot). Author Danie Barnardo
has some really ambitious plans for version 3 (expect betas in a few weeks).

Also, a new entry into the front-end/patch launcher genre is QcBud which is currently in open beta
testing.

Dank & Scud Interactive TidbitAdventures of Dank and
Scud author Michael Houston sent along this goodie to give a hint of what to expect
from his upcoming project Dank and Scud Interactive:

New Linux QSpy BetaThe second Linux
QSpy beta has been released (again, shift-click to download, if your browser tries to
display the file). Direct comments to author of the port Paul Miller who points out what's new:

This one has the new icons from QSPY 4.1, server source list
works, and a bunch of others things added (including player colors).

Phase IIModesty (FraQuake) sends along word of
an editor called Phase II that
looks unique (and seems perfect if you're intimidated by complexity):

A new vaguely eccentric Quake level designer, has been
unleashed. Destined to send level design leaping, hurtling 5 years into the past...Anyhow,
if you want a nice simple way to quickly make levels...
...here she is

Quest for Quest AuthorsTrey Harrison (one of the
authors of the as-of-now-deceased Quest) is looking for people who are well versed in the
use of Quest to help test a new project he's working on. If you know that program inside
out, and are interested in participating, email him.

Carmack vs. Gates: OpenGL vs. Direct3DThere's an article on Gamecenter
called Carmack vs. Gates:
OpenGL vs. Direct3D that was posted on Saturday (I'm still catching up on things). It
discusses John Carmack's recent comments about Direct3D being "a horribly broken
API". (Interesting that he ended up traveling to Redmond shortly after making that
comment?). Thanks to crash for this one.

January
19, 1997

Wired ArticleThere is an article in Wired called Braindrain at id. Mood 'Dark and
Gloomy' in which Ion Storm's John Romero shares his observations about the mood at id
Software since his departure. The article seems quite negative, Romero offering a little
return fire after Carmacks's comments about him being forced from id. In fact the interview with Carmack
where those comments appeared, is referred to in the article, as is Blue's News. Thanks MrMoonLgt.

Hipnotic Screenshots and Levelord's
LevelstatsHipnotic Interactive has some cool
new screenshots up on their site (thanks alberg).
Speaking of screenshots, I saw on The Void
that Hipnotic's ace level maker Levelord mentioned screenshots in his .plan today:

Our level designing article in the February issue of PC Games
is great, but the screen shots look horrible ;( ...have to find out why they're in
black-and-white and such a poor resolution. My apologies to all.

And, speaking of Levelord, he is kindly making available his own personal utility for checking levels for completeness.

I use it to make sure that I've got enough secrets,
deathmatch spawns, etc. for my levels. I've attached a sample output from my "Lost Mine" level. The program has been
modified to use our new weapons and such, but it should work fine with standard Quake
levels as well.

The program is currently hard-coded for standard Quake items
and our Hipnotic add-ons. When the pack is finished, I plan to make it more robust and
dynamically accept any "weapon"/"monster"/"item"/etc..

MIAA few missed updates here at the old Bluesnewsroom. I was LANing, and
fully expected to be able to update, but had trouble getting on line until I got home (and
have been having trouble FTPing to the site since then)... I'll catch up now and update, I
just wanted to let you know what was going on.